#DNARHMWIBAW
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don't need a rainbow here (my world is black and white)
Piers shouldn't be with these Rainbow Rocket weirdos.
*
There has been a terrible mistake.
One minute, Piers was celebrating his sister’s victory at the champion cup, and the next, he’s... He doesn’t know. There was a light, and he was falling, and —
and then he ended up here.
He sits up, rubbing his eyes. He doesn’t seem to be restrained, which is good. He’s not in a hospital, either, which is… probably good? Or it would be, if he had any idea what this place actually was.
It’s dark. There are red lights from the floor, the walls. It’s eerily quiet. Piers is reminded of one of the most boring clubs he’s ever been to — but at least this place smells alright. Small mercies.
“You’re awake.”
Oh, no.
Piers whips toward the voice, one hand going automatically to his belt for Obstagoon’s pokeball — but it’s not there. Of course. They must’ve taken his team while he was unconscious.
Well, if these bastards think he’ll be helpless without his Pokémon, they’re wrong. Piers may be scrawny and sick-looking, but he’s a dark-type specialist. He knows how to fight without brute force.
During this time, the other person in the room does not move to restrain him. In fact, all he does is give a quiet laugh.
Piers examines him. The other man is short, but he has an aura that fills the room. He’s wearing a suit with an R on the chest. He doesn’t seem like a corporate type — and Piers has seen more than his fair share of those — but rather like… a gang boss or something.
“Sorry if you were expecting a ransom,” Piers coughs out. “The league doesn’t care about the Spikemuth gym leader. They’ll tell you to keep me.”
But he’s not just the Spikemuth gym leader anymore, is he? He’s the champion’s brother. He knows Marnie would give anything to get him back safely.
“I must apologize. It seems we’ve started with a misunderstanding. You may call me Giovanni. And your name is…?”
Giovanni speaks with an accent similar to Kabu’s. Is he from one of the eastern regions? Stranger and stranger.
“...Piers.”
“Mr. Piers. I represent a coalition of certain people with… dark hearts, shall we say. We are working together for the time being. I believe you will fit in well with us.”
Piers blinks. What, is this an invitation to some interregional society of dark-type specialists? Which… would make a disturbing amount of sense with the kidnapping and all, but damn, what a stereotype.
“Yeah, mate, thanks but no thanks,” he says, standing up. “I don’t know how much ya heard from the news, but I can’t drop everything to join yer club. Nothing personal.”
Giovanni chuckles. “Come with me.”
Piers goes, partly because he’s curious, partly because it’s not like he can do anything else. He follows the man down a dark hallway, then through what seems to be a lobby, and then outside.
Outside is too hot. The sun is too bright. And the land… is not land.
It’s ocean, as far as the eye can see. In the distance, a flock of Wingull circle an island. Piers rubs his eyes, not quite believing what he’s seeing.
“As you may have noticed,” Giovanni says, “we are not in Galar at the moment.”
*
From there, Piers is more willing to listen. Giovanni gives him a tour, speaking vaguely about life in Kanto and the group’s current situation in Alola.
At the end, Piers is introduced to one young woman as something like his personal assistant.
“She speaks Galarian,” Giovanni explains. “Most of the other grunts don’t, so if you need something, come to her.”
She refuses to give him her name, making excuses about how the grunts weren’t supposed to use them, but she does allow him to call her J.
J’s alright. She reminds him of his gym trainers, in her earnestness and weirdness. She only comes when he calls for her. Otherwise, Piers is left to do as he pleases.
Right now he’s fine just staying in his room, occasionally going out to raid their kitchen or get fresh air.
At least his Pokemon are alright. Giovanni gives them back a few hours after showing Piers the ocean. Most of his team seems to notice no difference between this place and Spikemuth, but Obstagoon does. It’s simply not meant for such a warm climate.
Piers brings this up to J, and she agrees to set his room’s temperature to something more normal for Galar.
He trains. He sleeps. He keeps up his vocal exercises. It’s fine.
*
What Piers learns, over the course of a week, is this:
The multiverse exists, and he has traveled through it. Somehow, and nobody will explain how, Giovanni summoned Piers from the own world and has trapped him in this one.
In this world, Leon is still the champion. The date is a few years before Piers sent Marnie on her gym challenge, so it seems he has time traveled as well.
He’s not the only guest here, either. Around the building, there are others — but not dark-type specialists.
No, these people are gang leaders.
Piers sees them in passing, recognizing them and quickly making his escapes. There’s Ghetsis, the Unovan cult leader who attacked the league and came this close to destroying their government. There’s Archie and Maxie, the eco-terrorists who didn’t seem to understand that the earth needed both land and water. There’s Cyrus, who… Piers can’t even start with him.
Of course, just because these men were all would-be villains in his world, it didn’t mean they were the same in their home universes.
He asks J what their stories are.
“Oh. Uh, Maxie’s a real passionate sorta guy, even though he doesn’t look like it. He tried to summon this Pokémon in Hoenn, I don’t remember the name of it, wanted to use it to shrink the oceans, make more land.”
The rest of her stories pretty much follow what Piers read in the news, but for one key detail: back in their home universes, all the men had succeeded.
“You mean that guy Archie drowned the world? Nobody stopped him?”
“I’m sure Team Aqua survived?” J offers.
Piers stares in open-mouthed amazement. When he finds his words again, he asks, “And your boss doesn’t mind having these people here?”
“No? He likes them, I think? They all fit the same pattern, you know. Guy with vision leads a band of outlaws to fulfill his goal… and the second they do, Rainbow Rocket picks ‘em up and brings ‘em here. Isn’t that what happened with you?”
“What happened to me? I’m not like them—” But as soon as he says it, he has to reconsider. The description she’s given is so vague, it could very well apply to him. If wanting his sister to be champion counted as a vision, then he did, technically, have a vision. Team Yell was, technically, a band of outlaws.
He purses his lips, not liking the conclusion he’s drawn.
J says, hesitantly, “I don’t know what you did back home. Whatever it was, I won’t judge ya. After all, you gotta be here for a reason, right?”
*
Piers thinks about that as he steps into the kitchen at 11:30 that night. He can’t begin to guess why he would be in this world, but he at least knows what his goal is at the moment.
It’s stereotypically Galarian of him, he knows, crawling out of bed for a spot of tea. That’s fine; it’s not like there’s anyone around to see him.
Then the door opens.
“...Piers?”
Even with one word, there is no mistaking the voice.
Chairman Rose stands in the doorway, frozen as though in shock. He’s wearing one of those grey suits he likes so much, though the shirt is wrinkled and the tie missing. He’d probably fallen asleep at his desk.
He doesn’t look like he fits here, in a group of dangerous men. Piers has to admit that he himself matches the aesthetic of the place; Rose does not.
Rose says, “What did you do?”
Piers says, “Why don’t I make us tea an’ we can talk about it.”
The chairman seems to agree to that, even getting out the teacups while Piers boils the water. This never would have happened in his home world, and yet it’s the most familiar interaction he’s had since he arrived.
When they’re sitting at the kitchen table with their tea, Piers begins: “In my world, I’m the leader of a group called Team Yell. My sister Marnie is the champion.”
“Oh?”
“We didn’t cheat.” He’s defensive, he knows, but it’s not like he and Rose had a trusting relationship before all of this. “She won fair and square, on her own talents.”
“I wasn’t saying otherwise.”
“An’ what about you, then? What did you do that got you thrown here — besides being a billionaire, I mean.”
In Piers’ world, using that tone of voice on that word would make the chairman bristle. Here, Rose looks more mournful than offended.
“Who did your Marnie fight for the championship title?”
“Leon…? Why, is somebody else champion in your world?”
“His brother Hop is champion now, but he battled Leon for the title. Or... he would have. I was impatient. I moved too quickly.”
Rose shifts in his seat, pulling out a pokeball. No, not just any ball — a master ball. The Pokémon inside looks like none Piers has ever seen: almost wormlike, spiny, glowing with a dim red light.
“You asked what I did to deserve being here,” Rose murmurs. “I’ll tell you. I forced Leon to fight a Pokémon more powerful than anything Galar had ever seen. He died bringing it to me.”
...Arceus.
It takes Piers only a moment to process this information and then decide he doesn’t want to hear any more of it.
Rose looks like he’s about to start on one of his rambling speeches, so Piers quickly holds up a hand. “I don’t want to hear it. Let’s talk about somethin’ else.”
“Something else, as in…”
“Your first battle. Your latest charity project. Whatever.”
To his credit, Rose is skilled at conversation. He easily transitions to discussions of his university days, the music theory class he’d taken as an elective. It surprises Piers how much he knows… and yet he can’t say that the discussion isn’t interesting.
It’s the first time Piers has spoken to the league chairman without worrying about Spikemuth. It will not be the last.
*
Archie speaks just enough Galarian to make Piers feel like an idiot.
It’s not like he’s never thought about human influence on the environment — he lives in a smoke-filled city, after all — but to hear Archie talk of pollution and the Pokémon affected by it, Piers has to admit that awakening an ancient Pokémon isn’t the worst solution out there.
Archie doesn’t seem to know that Maxie is alive and well and in the castle. Piers doesn’t tell him.
*
One day J brings him a composition book and a small electric keyboard.
“Since you write music,” she says sheepishly. “Sorry I couldn’t get you a guitar or something. I went with the next best thing.”
She leaves him alone, and he writes down some lyrics for a new song.
It’s about a fictional lost romance, but the imagery is all about being trapped in paradise, about missing the gloom of his hometown.
Galar is going to love it. If he ever gets back, anyway.
He’d asked about his present universe counterpart once and received a tablet that was somehow connected to the internet. His other self is doing well, both as a gym leader and a musician. Piers thinks about reaching out, but in the end decides not to. He wouldn’t believe this story if someone tried telling it to him; his counterpart is likely no different.
Days pass.
*
Maxie speaks just enough Galarian to make Piers feel like an idiot.
It’s not like he’s never thought about land as a resource — Galar is technically an island, after all — but to hear Maxie speak of erosion and human life, Piers has to admit that the idea of awakening an ancient Pokémon could be reasonable.
Maxie doesn’t seem to know that Archie is here, too. Piers doesn’t tell him.
*
He runs into Cyrus one morning at breakfast.
Cyrus asks, “Are you the one I hear singing in Galarian?”
He looks dead inside as always, which, Piers thinks, is a mood.
“Tha’s me, yeah. M’ name’s Piers.”
“Your music is very… spirited,” Cyrus says.
“Thanks?”
“I would prefer not to hear it.”
“Ah.”
*
Piers spends a lot of time talking to Rose. It’s not what he would have expected or wanted, but Rose is the only other Galarian around.
Still, he’s isn’t bad company when the league isn’t involved. He’s fond of art and architecture and all those stereotypical rich people things, but he’s also well-versed in popular culture.
(“I didn’t take you for an Avengers fan.”
“Admittedly it was not something I sought out for myself. My son Bede—”
“Wait, you adopted Bede?”
“Of course. Didn’t my counterpart do the same?”)
That’s why, when his throat aches from practice and there’s nothing else to do, Piers goes looking for him.
Rose is in one of the conference rooms. He’s usually there; he’s said before that it’s comfortably familiar to him. It’s the man he’s talking to who grabs Piers’ attention, though.
Rose says, “Piers, allow me to introduce you to Lysandre. He is a friend in my world, and his counterpart is just as elegant and driven.”
Lysandre looks down at him, magnanimous and regal. It should make sense that he and Rose know each other. They’re rich philanthropists, captains of industry; even with their different regions, it makes sense they would know each other.
And yet.
Rose, for all his billionaire capitalist near-dystopian command of the region, did not come from money. At one point he was poor. At one point he worked in the mines, dirty work.
Lysandre is an aristocrat. Lysandre is one of those smarmy bastards who believes that a person’s value depends entirely on whether they’re productive. People like him say that Spikemuth is poor because they don’t try hard enough.
When Team Flare began their attempt at apocalypse, the power spots went wild. Piers spent the day helping in Hammerlocke and trying not to worry about little Marnie all alone in their flat.
It was only later that Piers learned something like the full story, from Galarian translations of Professor Sycamore’s explanations.
He didn’t like what he read.
“I’ve heard of you,” Piers says. “Yer the one who wanted to kill all the Pokemon, right?”
Rose frowns. “I assure you, no one loves Pokemon like Lysandre—”
“It had to be done,” Lysandre says.
His voice is deeper than Piers’ or Rose’s, and his words hang heavily in the air.
“Lysandre… what…”
“My apologies, Elijah. Where there is a scarce resource, there will be conflict. With conflict comes suffering. Pokemon are destined to be used by humans; the only way to prevent it was to remove them.” He sighs a world-weary sigh, then looks to Piers. “I cannot confirm if I was successful in my world, but that was my intention.”
Rose pales. “If you’ll excuse me, I have to — I must —”
He doesn’t finish the sentence. In a moment he’s rushing out the door, unsteady on his feet. Piers follows him. He finds him leaning against the wall, clutching his chest and sweating.
“Are you okay?” Shit, he’s not having a heart attack, is he?
“I'm fine. Physically,” Rose says. “It’s just — my Lysandre wouldn’t do that. He wouldn’t talk like that.”
“Mhm.”
“I hate this place,” Rose says. “I hate everyone in it — except you.”
“Mhm.”
*
Piers walks down the hall to find his path blocked by that man in the snuggie.
“Mr. Piers, was it?” Ghetsis asks. “A pleasure to meet you. My name is—”
“I know who you are. Not interested.”
“Come now, what harm could I possibly do to you here? You lose nothing by listening for a few minutes.”
“If you’re going to give me that ‘humans and Pokemon should be separated’ bull, save your breath. Galar watched your stunt at the league. We know you don’t even believe it yourself.”
He tries to force his way past, but Ghetsis remains firm. He’s like Lysandre, much taller than any normal person has any right to be. He stands unmoving, but the smile on his face grows bigger and more unnerving by the second.
(Piers misses Raihan.)
“Of course not,” Ghetsis says. “I wouldn’t insult your intelligence like that. After all, a dark-type specialist like yourself is no doubt familiar with strategy. Especially in your league.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Ghetsis chuckles. “You say you’ve seen my ‘stunt,’ as it were. I’ve seen yours, too. The league lets your town rot on purpose, and the only salvation they offer is for you to leave it? I know I would be angry, were I in your position.”
Deep breaths. He’s a manipulator; don’t let him get to you.
“And your champion — I’ve never seen someone so undeserving of what they were given—”
It’s only after Piers throws the punch that he realizes Ghetsis probably meant Leon and not Marnie.
Well, it’s no problem either way; Piers’ fist hits him square in the nose, making a satisfying sound as it connects. It seems Ghetsis is frailer than he looks. He stumbles back with a groan, giving Piers the chance to walk past him.
“Don’t talk to me again,” he calls over his shoulder.
Ghetsis only glares.
*
One day Piers opens a door to find a gigantic black Jellicent-woman hybrid on the other side.
“Ah,” J says when he stops screaming long enough to tell her what happened. “I see you’ve met the Motherbeast.”
He doesn’t dare ask what the story behind that is.
*
It says something that the emergency lights here are blue.
J rushes to him, grabbing him by the arm and pulling him down the hall.
“What’s happening?”
“We’re moving from our shielded position to a VLFS. The structure is currently occupied, so it’s not as smooth as we’d like. But don’t worry about it, Giovanni has a plan.”
A plan. Isn’t that reassuring.
There are grunts running everywhere. Piers catches glimpses of people in white and gold — the current occupants? They’re fighting against the Rockets.
Piers should help them. He’s a gym leader, and gym leaders are supposed to help people, right? Innocent bystanders vs invading criminals. It should be an easy choice. Piers should turn around — right — now — and…
...and he doesn’t.
He goes back to his room like a child, pretending he doesn’t see what’s going on around him. Let this region’s champion handle it, if there is one.
By the end of the hour, the lights are back to red.
*
Rainbow Rocket’s occupation of Aether Paradise lasts for an hour before someone comes tearing through the grunts.
Piers considers going out to meet them, but he holds back. He doesn’t feel like getting into a fight.
Still, his curiosity grows. A few minutes in and he’s walking out.
In the main room, a man holds two grunts at arms’ length. He’s tall, somewhere between Ghetsis and Lysandre in height. He’s wearing a baggy hoodie with a skull design on the back. He’s not a suited corporate type at all.
Piers decides he likes him.
“‘Ey, you two.” He pokes both of the grunts on their backs, nudging them away. “I’ll take care of this guy, a’right? Now scram.”
The grunts obey.
The man doesn’t seem grateful, but that’s reasonable: he didn’t look like he needed rescuing, really. He circles Piers, cracking his knuckles.
“So you’re with these guys, are you? Where’d ya put the prez?”
“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.” He holds up a hand, trying to ward off a potential fistfight. “‘M here ‘cause I train dark types an’ someone thought that makes a bad guy. M’ name’s Piers.”
The man puts his hands in his pockets, circling Piers. There’s something dark in his eyes; Piers sees it in the mirror every day.
At last the man says, “I’m Guzma, the boss of Team Skull. I like your shoes.”
His shoes, with the skulls on the heels. Punk recognizes punk.
Piers wonders if they’ve met before. He could have sworn, sometime during his stay here, that he’s heard the name.
Maybe Guzma’s counterpart is running around the castle somewhere.
“Who’s the prez you mentioned?”
“The prez. You know, the lady who owns this place? Lusamine. Tall white lady, hair like a cocoon down to her ankles?”
The Motherbeast. Or her counterpart, more likely.
“Haven’t seen her, sorry.”
“Hmph.” Guzma stomps to the wall and slumps against it. “Well, at least our champion’s here. She’ll beat you all down before long.”
Their champion. Piers pictures a muscular woman in her mid-twenties, a white cape flowing behind her.
“There she is! Hey, Moon! You find that Giovanni yet?”
In rushes a girl — no, two girls — both younger than Marnie. The dark-haired one looks up at Guzma and shakes her head.
“There’s one more room, Mr. Guzma,” her blonde partner says.
“Then go for it. Me an’ Piers here’ll make sure nobody goes after ya.”
The girls rush off. Guzma follows them with his eyes, and when they’re out of sight, he slumps back again.
“They’re good kids, Moon and Lillie. Didn’t have the best home lives, but they’re still holdin’ on… you gotta admire that, right?”
*
Giovanni calls the whole thing off. Apparently the others in this Rainbow Rocket gang got sent back to their universes by this scientist working for Aether. That simultaneously encourages Piers and pisses him off, because if this was possible all this time, someone should’ve offered him a ride home.
Better late than never, he supposes.
Colress has him and Rose in the same room, “because your universes have a similar frequency, so I can send you both home at once.”
Rose nods. “So, Piers, it seems this is where we say goodbye.”
“Yeah.” A chuckle. “Can’t say I’m looking forward to fighting with you about power spots and stadiums again.”
A wry smile. “Well… I’d give a farewell speech, but I believe you wouldn’t care for it. So let me say this instead: I am thankful to have had you here.”
“You, too.”
“And if I may ask you a favor…” Rose takes Piers by the shoulder, pulling him close. He whispers in his ear: “If your Rose is anything like me, he does genuinely care for Leon. Tell him to act like it, while he has the chance.”
Piers’ face feels warm. His chest tightens, and he feels dizzy… and then he falls.
He falls, and he lands on his face, and Arceus is that Marnie’s voice.
“Where were you?” Her voice has that pitch she gets when she’s about to cry, and Piers hurries to hug her. They’re sitting in… Wyndon Stadium? There’s Marnie’s Liepard, and on the other side of the pitch, a kid in a challenger uniform and their Kommo-o.
“How long was I gone?”
“Six. Freaking. Months. I went looking for you! But nobody had any idea where you could’ve gone… Where were you?”
He pats her back. “I… got lost. It’s a long story. ‘M sorry for leaving you, Mar. I promise I’ll never do that to ya again.”
*
*
*
When Champion Moon visits Galar for the World Tournament, she is introduced to their gym leaders.
She gives Piers a thoughtful look, but never says why.
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